Scorched Noir

by Garnett Elliott

  Copyright © 2015 by Garnett Elliott

  Previously published stories copyrighted by Garnett Elliott with the date it originally appeared online or in print.

  "Trailer de Fuego" first appeared in Hardluck Stories, 2006

  "Somerton Sangre" first appeared in Plots with Guns, 2004

  "Jesus Contra las Brujas Plasticas" first appeared in Plots with Guns, 2010

  "Nickel and Damned" first appeared in Shred of Evidence, 2007

  "Bad Night at Burning Rock" first appeared in A Twist of Noir, 2010

  "Snowflake" first appeared as "The Snowflake Generation" in The Flash Fiction Offensive, 2011

  "The Greatest Generation" first appeared in Plots with Guns, 2008

  "The Darkest of the Debbies" first appeared in Crime Factory, 2010

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the author, except where permitted by law.

  The stories herein are works of fiction. All of the characters, places, and events portrayed in this collection are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Cover image from Dreamstime; Design by dMix.

  PO Box 173

  Freeville, New York 13068

  USA

  Email: btapzine@beattoapulp.com

  Visit us at www.beattoapulp.com

  CONTENTS

  Introduction

  Trailer de Fuego

  Somerton Sangre

  Jesus Contra las Brujas Plasticas

  Nickel and Damned

  Bad Night at Burning Rock

  Snowflake

  The Greatest Generation

  The Darkest of the Debbies

  About the Author

  Also by Garnett Elliott

  Other BTAP Titles

  Connect with BEAT to a PULP

  Introduction

  Stuck in the southwest corner of Arizona, right between the California and Mexico borders, lies the desert city of Yuma. There's not much to it. A muddy length of the Colorado River. A Marine airbase. Some rippling sand dunes where they shot scenes from Return of the Jedi. In the summer, temperatures can climb into the hundred and twenties. The San Diego Padres used to do their spring training there, which prompted an old joke:

  YOUNG MAN TO HIS BOSS: I just drove through Yuma. Jesus, nothing but baseball players and hookers.

  BOSS (ANGRY): My mother's from Yuma.

  YOUNG MAN: Really? What position does she play?

  Like most border towns, the city has its share of crime. Hell, my old alma mater Yuma High School was originally based out of a territorial prison (the one they make reference to in 3:10 to Yuma). Our school mascot was a criminal, a guy in a striped suit with a ball and chain around his ankle. The only penal-themed mascot in the country, I believe. So it isn't surprising a lot of crime writers at least mention the place, from Chandler to Elmore Leonard, Cormac McCarthy, and more recently Christa Faust and Johnny Shaw.

  Many of the stories that follow are set in Yuma, or towns like it. I wrote them in the heyday of the neo-noir scene, when online magazines like Plots with Guns were busting out over the internet. With so much intimidating talent on display, I figured I'd better have some kind of angle to my work. So I wrote what I knew about: life in the scorching alkaline desert, desperate folks, and Old Mexico dreaming somewhere beyond the border. The stories didn't set the world on fire, but they got published.

  You grow up in a place like Yuma, you learn to take what you can get.

  Garnett Elliott

  Tucson, Arizona

  June 2015

  Trailer de Fuego

  Starry night filtered through the lime trees. Tench leaned against a tailgate, his fifth cup of Jack and warm Coke in a steady hand, listening to his fellow corrections officers talk about the day's work. They hunkered in a circle a couple trucks down. Most were just off shift and still in their tan uniforms.

  Someone came drifting over, the firefly glow of a cigarette cocked in his mouth. Tench smelled the sweat on him and frowned. It was Stewart, the new guy. Nervous. He walked up to the tailgate and stood there for a moment, shifting from one foot to the other while Tench stared at him.

  "Shit, but it's hot," Stewart said at last. "Sun's been down a couple hours and it still feels like ninety."

  "Probably is."

  "Doesn't it drop at night?"

  "Not much during the summer. You don't like heat, you shouldn't have moved to Arizona."

  He let the implications of that hang.

  Stewart pushed back strands of limp hair. "I heard you, ah, handled that situation for me today."

  Tench grinned. Set his drink down and fished in his back pocket for a moment. Came up with a loaded sock and handed it over for Stewart to inspect.

  "It's light," Stewart said, hefting the thing. A look crossed his face like maybe Tench was putting him on. "What's it filled with?"

  "Soap shavings."

  "Soap? What for?"

  "Doesn't leave any marks that way."

  "You actually hurt him with this?"

  'Him' being Hector Tamayo, the little banger stashed in D Pod, where they put the violent types. Tamayo had threatened Stewart his first day on the job. Reached up through the cell bars and shoved something hard against his back. Whispered it was a shank and he could have Stewart any time he wanted, he didn't show proper respect. Stewart had told Tench and half the guys in the break room about it afterward. Tearfully.

  "Yeah, I hurt him," Tench said. "Took a couple swipes to the gut. Tough beaner, but he went down. He didn't have no shank in there, by the way. He threatened you with a piece of cardboard."

  Stewart still didn't look convinced. About the sock, anyway. He kept lifting it up like he couldn't believe how light it was.

  Tench grunted. Snatched the sock out of his hand. Swung, letting his wrist go loose at the right moment, so the weighted end hit with the proper snap. He caught Stewart on the thigh. The little soap chips made a crunching sound that echoed through the groves and Stewart went down on one knee, moaning. The cigarette dropped from his lips.

  "S'all in the wrist," Tench said. "Pussy."

  He chuckled. There was a smattering of laughter from the other officers. Stewart looked up at him with moist eyes.

  "I didn't hurt Tamayo to protect you," Tench said. "I did it to protect the rep. Our rep. Guys like you are dangerous. Get hard, fast, or get out of jailhouse work."

  Silence from Stewart. The other officers had gone quiet, too. No one was going to offer any objections. Not to Tench. He held the line against all the hard-asses in County, dispensing pain and intimidation where needed. Somebody had to. He made the job easier for the rest of the guards and they knew it.

  Stewart wobbled to his feet, face downcast. Nobody tried to help him. He limped out of sight and about a minute later came the sound of a truck door opening, an engine turning over.

  Conversation seeped back after the truck drove away. Tench finished his drink. He congratulated himself on doing a smooth job with Stewart. Old Tench, holding court from the back of his pickup. The other officers would come to him later in the evening, respectful, ask for a few pointers in handling cons. And he'd dispense wisdom based on his fifteen years working penal institutions from the deep dark South to Texas to this chicken-shit border town.

  Someone was walking up right now, as a matter of fact. A tall silhouette in a cowboy hat. Tench felt his gut hitch with recognition. Him? Coming all the way out here? But that's who it was, Don Gustavo, a big smile plastered on his greaser face. Looking more like some old vaquero than the local head of the Mexican Mafia.

  He took the cowboy hat off, held it over his chest. Tench started to say something but Gustavo raised his hand
. "I know, you're uncomfortable talking to me here." There was some urgency in his voice. "I would like to have arranged a meeting, but—"

  "Don't sweat it," Tench said, belching carbonation into the warm night air. "None of these guys are going to give a shit. But let's go around to the other side of the truck, okay?" No sense airing his dirty business where co-workers could hear.

  They walked deeper into the lime's shadow. Gustavo looked pretty sharp for a greaser, Tench had to admit, with his neatly creased Wranglers and snakeskin boots. Had a nice belt-buckle on him, too; Navajo silver and turquoise, gleaming in the dimness.

  "I brought you something," Gustavo said. He reached under his shirt and handed Tench a tiny package wrapped in duct tape, slick with belly-sweat.

  "Whoa," Tench said, palming the bundle instantly. He knew what it was.

  "That hasn't been cut yet. It came all the way from Peru."

  Tench frowned. "You want me to distribute?" Not his usual kind of work with Gustavo.

  "No. It's payment. I need you to do something, tonight."

  Tench felt a grin creep around the corners of his mouth. He was holding about four thousand dollars' worth of blow, easy. And he knew a truck stop in the foothills where he could move it all in one night.

  "There is a gentleman living in Dateland," Gustavo said. "Alone. He's had connections with La Familia in the past. I need some names from him and a guarantee of silence afterwards. I don't want him hurt badly."

  "Not too badly," Tench said, still grinning.

  "Observe some restraint, please. I may need him again."

  "Okay."

  Gustavo leaned close and whispered details: the man's name, an address in Dateland. Specifics about the information he wanted. Was there much security? No, the man did not have a bodyguard. No dogs. Probably owned a gun, so some caution would be necessary. Tench told him everyone in Dateland was armed to the teeth, so no worries. They shook.

  "Something wrong, chief?" Tench said. "I've never seen you rushed before."

  Gustavo's eyes narrowed. It was like twin cracks opening in his head, letting Tench see the cold fire that always burned back there. "Just do this tonight," he said. He put his hat back on and strolled away quick as he came. Tench flipped him off behind his back. Fucking Mexicans. Getting all uppity like they were serious mobsters. Like they knew half the crap they were talking about. He'd take their money, sure, but he was getting tired of second-generation wetbacks telling him what to do.

  Then he remembered Hector Tamayo. The little greaser's cries echoing up and down D Pod, falling on ears suddenly gone deaf. And his smile came back.

  * * *

  He left the grove at midnight, where the party was still going strong. Some of the crazy fucks would be clocking back in at five in the morning, wouldn't even go home or change their uniforms. Tench had been there once.

  A patrol car pulled up the dirt road just as he was pulling out and flashed its lights. He slowed, rolled down the window. The two young patrolmen didn't recognize his face, so he took the badge off his pocket and showed them that.

  "Just having a party back there, officers," he said, pointing at the dark trees. "Just a bunch of screws cutting loose."

  They laughed at that and waved him on.

  * * *

  He pulled off from the frontage road on the way home. Gave old Gustavo's stuff an experimental toot and hell yes, it was pure. Live current coursed through his teeth.

  All the lights were on in the double-wide as he parked. Leeza was awake. Shit. Well, this was a working night and she'd have to deal. He winced walking up the steps and hearing her techno pop playing on the stereo. "Workout music," she called it. Leeza was from West L.A. and bitches up there obviously didn't know any better.

  She was waiting for him at the kitchen table, scowling, cigarette in hand and a whole ashtray crowded with butts. Wearing one of his Sturgis T-shirts—goddamn it, the one with the Old English lettering. And a pink thong. Probably thought it made her look sexy, but all it was doing was reminding him the trailer's carpets needed cleaning.

  "You're late," she said, like they were married or something.

  "The fuck it is to you?"

  She started screeching. He ignored her and rummaged in the refrigerator. Jesus, Leeza could screech. He'd picked her up two weeks ago at the Tapper, one of the skuzziest topless joints this side of Sonora, and he'd been stone drunk when it happened. He didn't remember sleeping with her. He wasn't sure he actually had, but she'd wasted no time moving her skinny ass and all her stuff into his trailer.

  "You don't like it here," he said around a mouthful of cottage cheese, "you can get the—"

  "Tench, honey?" Her voice had suddenly changed. She was looking at his eyes.

  "What?"

  "Are you tweaking?"

  "What do you mean, am I 'tweaking'?"

  "Did you score some … cocaine?"

  She spoke the last word with reverence. Her sallow tongue slipped out and wet her lips.

  "Maybe," he said, taking a step back.

  Her face brightened like a vampire's. "You're holding."

  "Calm down."

  She came at him with crooked fingers, clawing at his jeans and belt buckle. He wasn't sure if she was trying to get the coke off him or give him a blowjob so he'd share. Either way was scary. He shoved her back and she collided with the kitchen table, spilling cigarette butts and a wave of ash.

  "I said, calm the fuck down!"

  But she sprang up, grinning. Started clawing for him again. He couldn't do this, waltz around all night with a job waiting for him in Dateland. He made a fist and clocked her as she groped for his pants, scarred knuckles connecting with her temple. She staggered into the little cabinet by the sink that held his shot glass collection. Both Leeza and the cabinet struck the linoleum at the same time. Glass tinkled.

  Oh shit.

  He bent to examine the collection. His Harley Commemorative had shattered, and there was a fracture in the little cup he'd won that night he sang karaoke at Gentleman's Choice.

  Leeza made gurgling noises. He turned to stare pure hatred at the little coke-whore bitch. He could tell she was unconscious by the way she was breathing. Well, it was better than she deserved. He picked the cabinet up and carefully set it on the table.

  In the bedroom he changed into coveralls, transferring Don Gustavo's payment to his bib pocket. No point trying to hide the stuff here. Leeza, when she came to, would tear the trailer apart trying to find it. He felt around under the bed and hauled out his old axe-handle, a worn leather gag, and a handful of zip ties. Nothing fancy for tonight. Gustavo wanted a quick job, and besides, Tench had learned long ago that his hands were his best tools.

  He checked Leeza's breathing one last time to make sure he wouldn't be coming back to a corpse. The techno pop noise had faded but he busted up the stereo anyway, on account that it was hers and the loss of property would strike a karmic balance for his broken shot glasses.

  And just maybe the bitch would get it in her head to leave.

  * * *

  He drove the pickup through the rock gullies of Telegraph Pass, desert night and the buzz of AM radio his only companions. Beyond the mountains the land stretched out in a gray blanket. It would take an hour of chewing highway to make Dateland, so he leaned back and drowsed a little, letting his hands and his eyes do the driving.

  Hell, everybody wanted a piece of Old Tench tonight. The spat with Leeza aside, things were looking peachy. He had a uniform and he had mob connections and he could flit between both worlds like all those illegals slipping across the border. Four thousand dollars' worth of blow didn't hurt his self-esteem, either. He could make a down on a righteous truck with that kind of money.

  Some weak-minded type might call him a torturer, might spit when they said the word, but the truth was there would always be a calling for someone who could ask questions and get answers. Someone who wouldn't balk when the screaming started. Was it his fault he was good at it? He'd read
somewhere that even certain bad-ass Nazis had had their limits, had broken under the strain of inflicting misery on other humans. Well, that wasn't him. Maybe an upbringing in rural Mississippi and a dad who dealt justice with a cattle prod would've set those SS fuckers straight.

  He thought about that, and when the high beams hit the sign that said thirty miles to Dateland he slowed a little. Best to keep his mind on tonight's job. The coldness he'd glimpsed in Don Gustavo reminded him that the man, greaser or not, was someone you didn't want to cross.

  * * *

  He found the whispered address down a dirt road, about three miles from town proper. 'Town' for Dateland meant a Chevron with a convenience store attached, plus the rows of palm groves that gave the place its name.

  His victim lived in a lonely double-wide. It kind of reminded Tench of his own place, only shabbier, surrounded by scrub grass and mesquite. He drove by it to check the numbers on the dented mailbox and make sure. A light burned in the rearmost window. There was an El Camino parked on one side.

  He continued driving past for about two minutes, cut the lights, then swung around and stopped. He'd hoof it from here. Place like this, you could hear things coming for miles around.

  He hopped a drooping barbed wire fence. The moon was up and cast silver on a field of yucca and broken beer bottles. His feet crunched glass as he walked. He could see the trailer's single lit window in the distance, winking at him, drawing him like the proverbial moth.

  He'd heard stories about the people in Dateland. Not so much a place to live as a place to lay low. Criminals with warrants on them in other states, crazy old vets who strung claymore mines around their property. Of course, if the place wasn't dangerous, then Gustavo wouldn't have sent someone like Old Tench, would he? Would've sent one of his own soft greasers instead.

  The trailer window drew closer. He stopped about forty feet away. His victim's name was Juan Smith, which sounded bogus and probably was. What mattered was that Smith knew some of the people hauling Mexican Sudafed across the border for meth kitchens in Southern Arizona. And Don Gustavo wanted to know who these people were.